


Finding a Sentinel

by Bluewolf458



Series: Blair's Life (AU) [4]
Category: The Sentinel (TV)
Genre: Gen, Sentinel Bingo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-18
Updated: 2018-09-18
Packaged: 2019-07-14 01:25:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16030124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluewolf458/pseuds/Bluewolf458
Summary: Blair gets a ride along to study the police, and meets Jim





	Finding a Sentinel

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Sentinel Bingo prompt 'canon fork'

Finding a Sentinel

by Bluewolf

After Blair graduated and Eli Stoddard made him his assistant, Naomi decided to move away from Cascade and resume the life of traveling around that Blair knew she had loved until she brought him to Cascade, first to attend school, and then, second, Rainier.

He had seen some signs of restlessness in her as he neared graduation, and wasn't really surprised when she started going away on short trips - though he was grateful that she eased him fairly gently into managing on his own before heading off abroad again.

When she left on her first trip he had wondered how he would manage, because she had always been there. But once he was completely on his own...

To his surprise, Blair found that living on his own was very comfortable. Certainly Naomi had always encouraged him to fend for himself, had, for as long as he could remember, treated him much as she treated everyone else in her life. Well, apart from sharing a bedroom - until he was about eight, when they stayed in a hotel or motel they shared a room, but after that he always had a room to himself; "You're not a baby now," she'd said. "If you have a problem during the night, phone my room, but I don't think you'll have any problems."

And he never did.

On the rare occasions when they met someone Naomi half fell in love with, wanted to stay with for a while, and moved in with, once or twice his bed was a couch in the living room, but more often it was a small guest bedroom - and again, he knew that if he had a problem, all he had to do was go to the door of the room she was in, and bang on it.

He never did.

But calling on her for help had always been an option... an option he no longer had. If there was a problem, he'd have to deal with it himself.

Oh, well... it wasn't as if he hadn't always chosen to do that.

He was a little worried that his fellow TAs might realize that because he was - basically - in his own house, he had money, and was quite prepared to give them a modified truth - that the apartment was his mother's, but she had gone to visit relatives and probably wouldn't be back for quite a while. (In truth, he had no idea where she had gone.)

But he wasn't really too concerned; his only real friend at Rainier was Eli Stoddard, his adviser. He had been too much younger than the other students for them to socialize with him; indeed, he was still younger than many of the other TAs. No, he had never mixed with anyone in his own age group, and he was quite happy with his own company.

As long as he had books.

And he now had a slowly-growing library to give him company, any time he wanted it.

***

Blair had always fully intended to aim for a PhD; however, his interests were wide and he was having difficulty in deciding on a subject for it. The day came when he discussed his options with Eli, and that didn't help much; all it established, in both of their minds, was that there was no single aspect of anthropology that Blair found more enthralling than any other, or wanted to study in the depth that would be required for a PhD dissertation.

Indeed, with a wry chuckle, Blair admitted that he would probably be happier writing anthropology-based fiction than trying to become an expert in one aspect of anthropology.

Eli shook his head at that. "You write well, and you'd probably do well as a writer, but it would be something of a waste of your brains. But seriously -

"You can't continue as a grad student teaching associate all your life," he pointed out. "Yes, as long I'm a tenured professor at Rainier I'll be glad to have you as my TA, but I'm beginning to think that I want to begin doing more work in the field before I get too old for expedition life; the Indonesian countries, for example. Once there were many hunter-gatherer tribes there, but the governments are killing off that way of life by logging, then using the felled ground for farming."

Blair nodded; Eli wasn't telling him anything he didn't already know.

"There is less and less natural jungle where the tribes can live their traditional lifestyle; the people are being forced into 'civilization'. I'd like the chance to study the handful that are left before their way of life disappears for ever. Just between you and me, my boy, I'm seriously thinking of leaving Rainier at the end of this academic year and moving to Indonesia - probably Borneo - for two or three years. If I do go, I'll be taking a small group with me - possibly a maximum of five men. Or perhaps four men and one woman - the wife of one of the men - who can establish contact with the tribal women.

"I'd be more than happy to include you in that group," he added, "but you're at a stage in your academic life when committing two or three years to a study like this could be a mistake. You need to get your PhD first.

"Seriously, Blair, I've been wondering... your main interest up till now has been cultural anthropology, leaning on tribal culture; you know a lot about the way of life of a lot of indigenous people - but because you haven't been able to settle on a subject for your doctorate, I've been wondering if you mightn't be wise to alter your focus and think about modern man living in a city culture for a topic."

Blair frowned as he considered that.

He had never thought of modern man in the western world as an anthropological subject. Yes, he had considered how little the way of life in some countries, especially in the rural areas, had changed over the centuries as a possible topic, but the whys of that seemed almost too difficult to pinpoint.

"It would certainly be a new aspect of anthropology for me," he said slowly.

"Go home," Eli said. "Think about it, then come back in the morning and we can discuss it a little more."

"Yes," Blair said. "Thanks, Eli; and Eli - I can understand why you'd like to spend more time in the field, but your insights as a teacher... You're brilliant!"

"You're prejudiced," Eli told him.

Blair chuckled, and left.

***

In the morning, when he knocked on Eli's door and entered, he was feeling more hopeful about his dissertation subject than he had been for a long time.

Eli looked at him, and grinned. "You've thought of something," he said.

"Yes. In a tribal culture, everyone shares work and responsibility. Certainly the tribe has a chief who directs what they do, a shaman whose responsibility is the health of the community - physical or mental - but apart from that, everyone is a sort of jack of all trades. But once villages began to grow into cities, people began specializing in specific jobs - potters, tailors, builders, even shopkeepers selling things like food. So I wondered if I could do something about that... how society has changed from... well, everybody taking responsibility for the welfare of their community to specialization. Or - perhaps more realistically - seeing if I could find out what makes some people choose those specialized jobs - like firemen or police, and if they feel in any way set apart from the general community because of it."

Eli's grin broadened. "I think you could well have a viable idea there," he said. "I'd suggest, though, that you choose one and concentrate on that, rather than try to write about several."

Blair nodded. "I did think that might be more doable," he said. "It's just a question of deciding which one."

"I'd suggest the police," Eli said. "Hold on a minute." He reached for his phone, and dialed a number. "Hello, Simon - Eli here... Yes... Yes... Yes, the TA I was talking about agrees that he would like to study the work of the police, and what has drawn them to that work, and... yes. If you would. Thanks, Simon, I owe you." He hung up, and returned his attention to Blair. "Captain Simon Banks; I've known him for several years - he's a good friend," he said. "Heads Major Crime. His department has a very good reputation, has a very high solve rate. It would be a good one for you to start in, and anyone he's willing to sponsor will be accepted by other departments as worth giving time to. He's coming here now to meet you."

Blair's jaw dropped slightly. He had expected to be left to make his own contacts - he certainly hadn't expected Eli to provide this degree of help. But then when he thought about it, he realized that he shouldn't be surprised.

Eli had always been very supportive.

***

They spent the next half hour discussing what Blair might include in the study of the police, finally being interrupted by a brisk knock on the door, which was clearly intended only as courtesy because it opened at the same time.

Blair glanced over.

He was used to being, if not the smallest man in a group, certainly one of the smallest; but this black man absolutely dwarfed him. He had to be at least four inches taller than six foot.

"Simon! Hello!" Eli said.

"Hello, Eli. And this is your TA?"

"Yes - Blair Sandburg. Blair, Captain Simon Banks."

Blair grinned. "Hello, sir." He suspected that this police Captain would not appreciate the familiarity of being called 'Simon' by a new acquaintance.

Banks looked at him. "No offense, kid, but you look very... " He hesitated, clearly searching for a word that wouldn't sound derogatory.

"Young?" Blair offered.

"Well, yes."

"I _am_ over twenty-one," Blair said.

Banks looked from him to Eli, who chuckled. "I told you Blair's been my assistant for nearly two years. What I didn't say is that he started at Rainier when he was sixteen. He had his Masters before he was twenty."

Banks slowly shook his head. "Before he was twenty?" he said, his voice disbelieving.

"Simon, he'd have his PhD by now if he'd been able to choose a subject for it; but his range of interests is so wide... Finally we sat down and talked about his options, and as I told you was likely, he decided that studying the work of one of the 'protect and serve' groups in the western world would offer him the most scope.

"Because he'll be working for his PhD, I'll get the classes he normally teaches covered; he won't have to split his time between Rainier and the PD."

Banks was still frowning slightly. "There is just one problem. Normally we'd give a civilian studying police work a ninety day ride along, preferably with a detective who doesn't have a regular partner. Unfortunately, I only have one detective working without a partner at the moment, and frankly I wouldn't inflict Ellison on anyone as young as Mr. Sandburg - when you spoke to me, I assumed he was probably at least in his mid-twenties, not just 'over twenty-one'. Ellison is a brilliant detective, but his people skills are less than non-existent.

"His last partner was more experienced and managed - somehow - to bond with him; but Jack disappeared suddenly and without trace several months ago. Since then... Well... "

"I'm willing to try," Blair said.

Eli nodded. "Blair's people skills are excellent," he said.

"Since Jack disappeared, Ellison wouldn't readily accept even the archangel Gabriel as a partner!" Banks muttered.

"Somehow I can't see Gabriel being much good as a cop," Blair said. "Law enforcement, yes - but he'd be too much used to snapping his fingers - or his wings - and sending the bad guys straight to hell. All your cases would go unsolved, the perpetrators disappeared without trace."

Banks stared at him a for a moment, a grin lightening his face. "Why do I suddenly think you would be able to cope with Ellison? All right. It'll be for a trial period only - " He was looking at Eli as he spoke - "and I'm not promising anything except that if partnering your kid with Ellison doesn't work because of Ellison's attitude, I'll put in a good word for Sandburg with one of the other departments - probably Vice. It deals with the widest range of cases after Major Crime."

"Thanks, Simon," Eli said.

"Okay, kid - report to me at the PD tomorrow morning, 8am."

"Thank you, Captain," Blair said quietly.

"And Simon - tomorrow? Ellison won't know what's hit him," Eli said.

***

Blair spent the rest of the day going over his lesson plans with Eli's newly appointed assistant, Henry Travis, who was actually still writing his Masters' thesis but was close to finishing. (Knowing that he would be pushing Blair into positively working on his PhD dissertation, Eli had begun looking for a new assistant some weeks previously; even though he was planning on leaving Rainier fairly soon, he was still going to need a TA for the period before he actually left.)

Whatever happened, Blair was determined that, somehow, he would get his PhD dissertation written over the next year. Once he had presented and defended that dissertation, once he was Dr. Sandburg, if he wanted to continue at Rainier he knew he would have to apply for a position in his own right, not as the assistant to another professor. But, of course, there was that one detail - Eli, who would be his prime supporter, planned to move from teaching to field work inside that year.

Well, time to worry about what he would do was after he finished writing his dissertation.

One thing was certain; he might, probably would, choose to work, but he wouldn't actually have to work. He had saved much of the allowance Naomi had given him, and after she left he had chosen to live frugally, saving even more, and he had a very healthy bank account. Naomi had actually transferred the apartment to him when she left Cascade; if he, too, eventually chose to leave Cascade he could sell it and that would add to his finances.

***

Naomi had always tended to regard clocks as the roughest of guides, and if she missed a bus or train because she was five minutes late would simply shrug, mutter something uncomplimentary about people who allowed themselves to be ruled by a piece of machinery, and settle down to wait for the next one.

Despite his early years of living with that casual approach to time and timetables, school had quickly taught Blair that timetables were there for a purpose and that being late for an appointment was not a good idea; that at best it was rude, and at worst could be an extreme inconvenience for whoever he was meeting.

He therefore arrived at the PD at ten to eight, giving himself ten minutes to find Banks' office.

On entering the building, he crossed to Reception. "Hello. I've got an appointment with Captain Banks at eight - the name's Sandburg."

"Ah - yes, Mr. Sandburg. We have a visitor's pass for you."

"Thanks." Blair pinned it to his lapel.

"Seventh floor, turn right after you leave the elevator, it's the third door. Captain Banks is already in."

"Thanks," Blair said again, and turned to the elevators.

One was standing waiting, and he rode it to the seventh floor, turned right; and the third door was clearly marked 'Major Crime'. He went in.

Only one desk had an occupant - the woman sitting at it glanced up as the door opened, and smiled. "Mr. Sandburg?"

"Yes."

She indicated a door marked 'Captain Simon Banks'. "Captain Banks is in."

"Thanks." Eventually he was bound to speak to someone who needed an answer other than 'thanks', he decided. Crossing to the door, he knocked.

"Come in."

"Hello, Captain."

"You've beaten everyone else apart from Rhonda and me," Banks said. "That's good - I appreciate punctuality."

"Yes, sir."

"Have a seat."

Blair sat in one of the two chairs facing the desk.

"I've warned Ellison that he'll have a ride along today and for the immediate future," Banks said. "Doesn't mean it'll make him any happier about it, but it means I'm not springing you on him - he's had a few hours to think about it."

"Yes, sir."

"Now - I've been thinking over what Dr. Stoddard told me - am I right in thinking that you will want to speak to the other detectives about what drew them to police work? And possibly some of the men - and women - in other departments?"

"Eventually," Blair said. "Observing Detective Ellison, and what he does to solve crimes, will come first. If he does make it impossible for me to work with him, then the focus will be on the work of whoever I do end up with. One of the things I would like to observe, though, is a police partnership, and I realize I won't get that from Detective Ellison."

Banks nodded. "I could assign you to ride for a few days with Brown and Rafe," he said. "They're so apparently mismatched you'd wonder how they manage to exist in the same room - but they're a really good pairing."

Blair grinned. "Something like that would be ideal," he said.

There was a brisk knock on the door. "Come in!" Banks said.

The man who entered was a little smaller than Banks, but still about six inches taller than Blair; a man who would be quite surprisingly handsome if it weren't for the grim 'keep your distance!' look on his face.

"Ah, Ellison. Sit down."

Blair could see the 'I'd prefer to stand' that hovered on Ellison's face, but Banks faced him down and he sat. Stiff, not relaxed at all, and carefully not looking at Blair.

"Ellison, this is Blair Sandburg, your ride along."

Ellison finally looked at Blair. "This... this kid?"

"I'm over twenty-one, Detective, and I've been totally responsible for myself for nearly two years," Blair said quietly.

"Can you handle a gun?" The tone said 'Of course you can't'.

"I'm out of practice," Blair said, "but yes, I can." He spared a brief thought for 'Uncle' Dan, who had taught him to shoot when he was eleven. Naomi hadn't been best pleased, considering Blair's age, but accepted that it would let Dan bond with Blair.

Ellison's scowl intensified. "You're wanting to ride with the police for a PhD, right?"

"Yes."

"I don't want to see my name anywhere on it."

"That would be unethical. I wouldn't even call you Detective E. Detective V, maybe; unless your first name happened to be Victor, or Vincent, or - "

"No, it isn't," Ellison snapped.

"So Detective V would make you nice and anonymous. If possible I won't even say that I was riding with a detective in Major Crime - I can call Captain Banks 'Captain Y' - again nicely anonymous - or just 'the Captain'. Even when I've been writing about members of tribes that don't even have a written language I've used pseudonyms for them - and often even a pseudonym for the tribe. So I could say I had a ride along with Detective V in Violent Crimes - some police departments do have a Violent Crimes department. That would draw attention away from Cascade PD."

"Tribes... " Ellison looked a little startled.

"I'm an anthropologist, Detective. I've been on several expeditions - mostly fairly short ones - into what is often referred to as 'uncharted territory'. The most interesting one was probably a visit to the Kombai of Irian Jaya, three years ago. The report I did on that trip did have to use the name 'Kombai' - it's too well known that they live in houses built high in the trees - Sorry, that's getting away from the point." Out of the corner of his eye he could see Banks not quite successfully hiding a grin.

"All right, I'll accept that you have more experience of life than I would have thought." He glanced at Banks. "How long is this for?"

"It's the standard ninety day ride along. After that he'll still be here, but speaking to the personnel in different departments."

"All right; I'll give him a chance." The tone was very ungracious, but Blair grinned cheerfully.

"I'm sure we'll have a very fruitful three months, Detective."

Ellison's scowl said that he had a different opinion.

***

Blair followed Ellison to his desk. The detective gestured towards a wall. "Get yourself a chair."

Blair grinned, walked over to the three chairs sitting there and carried one back to the desk and put it at the side, rather than the front.

"The first thing you have to know is that police work is nothing like you see on television, so if you have visions of running regularly down the road pursuing the bad guys, just forget them," Ellison said.

"I might think that of a cop on the street, chasing a law-breaking motorist who's making a run for it, but I realize that detectives are more likely to be considering statements from victims or witnesses," Blair replied.

Ellison's eyebrows lifted.

"I'm working for a PhD, remember," Blair went on. "A PhD is an academic document, giving basic facts, often in very dry wording. Professor Stoddard, my adviser, reminded me of that when we were discussing what would be relevant to include. The odd chase of a criminal could be fitted into a reworked PhD meant as a book for the general public, but it would have no place in the document presented to the university. Even if I were doing my ride along with Patrol, I wouldn't be able to include 'exciting' chases; I'd have to word anything like that in impersonal, general terms, just giving the facts. If I tried putting in something like 'I was terrified as Officer A drove at speeds approaching 100 mph, and glad of the seat belt as we skidded around corners', I'd be told that wasn't academic wording and to make it more impersonal. It would become 'Pursuit of criminals in cars is normally conducted at high speed; police drivers must of necessity be highly skilled'. But I could put being terrified back in if I subsequently turned the document into a non-fiction book about the police.

"Regarding my work with you - 'Detective V and his colleagues spend much of their time either interviewing witnesses or - " with a glance at the piles of paper neatly piled on Ellison's desk - "reading through several witness reports looking for common ground."

"I'm surprised that - "

Ellison's voice was cut off by a loud clatter in the corridor. He clapped his hands over his ears, an expression of agony on his face.

Blair jumped, then relaxed as the noise quickly diminished. "What the... " He broke off as he realized that Ellison was not relaxing. "Detective?" He put a gentle hand on Ellison's arm.

Ellison looked at him, then almost reluctantly took his hands away from his ears.

"Are you all right?" Blair asked.

"Loud," Ellison whispered.

"Yes," Blair agreed. "It was, but everything's gone quiet now."

Ellison shook his head. "I can still hear metal reverberating," he said.

Blair's jaw dropped. "You must have very acute hearing," he said softly.

"Too acute," Ellison muttered.

Blair looked searchingly at him, remembering the content of a book he had bought not long after he started his academic career. It was a book over a century old - he had bought it hoping to gain from it some insight into the way anthropologists had worked in the nineteenth century, but although it had been interesting - and interesting enough to keep and reread more than once - it had been too specialized for his purpose. "Is it just your hearing, or are your other senses very acute too?" he asked.

"All of them," Ellison muttered, almost too quietly for Blair to hear him.

With an effort, Blair kept his jaw from dropping. It looked as if that purchase might just prove to have been more useful than it had appeared to be, on first reading. Could he -

No. His PhD would be on the work of the police, not on one detective who just happened to have five senses more acute than most people.

"Do they all give you problems?"

"Sometimes."

Blair nodded. "I've got a book at home," he said, keeping his voice quite low. "It was written over a century ago. It's mostly about men with acute senses living in a tribal culture and how much they were valued by their tribes. I'll bring it in tomorrow and lend it to you; you might find something in it that'll help you."

Ellison looked at him. "If it was written last century there can't be many copies still around, so it must have been expensive... We just met an hour or so ago and yet you're prepared to lend it to me?"

"It wasn't that expensive - I got it in a secondhand bookshop where most of the books were cheap paperbacks. I doubt the owner of the shop had much idea of what it might have been worth. I could see that even at $10 he thought he was overcharging, and I could have haggled him down to maybe $5, but then I'd have been cheating him, rather than him cheating himself."

"If you're sure... "

"It's worth a read, even if it doesn't help you much. I only kept it because it was quite interesting - it didn't give me the kind of info I was hoping for."

***

When he went home that evening, Blair's first move was to his bookshelf to pull out The Sentinels of Paraguay. He left it lying on the table while he prepared a meal, then as he ate he leafed through it, reminding himself of what it said - it was some time since he had actually re-read it.

Yes... he had known there was something he would call helpful in there... but would the information there help Detective Ellison? Hard to say.

He finished his meal, put the book in his backpack, washed the dishes, and settled down to write up some of his conclusions from the day.

Not that there was much yet. Just a vague overview of what a detective's job involved. But if he could keep his observations up to date, adding to them each day, it would mean he was writing his dissertation as he went along, and would find it fairly easy to consolidate everything into the final document.

***

Blair arrived at the PD next morning with two or three minutes to spare, finding Ellison already at his desk and buried in reading a report.

Hmmm... if Ellison was spending all of his time just sitting there reading, Blair realized that he wasn't going to get much information on police work from him. Blair dumped his backpack beside the desk, retrieved a chair and took it back to where he had been sitting the previous day. He dug into his pack, took The Sentinels of Paraguay out of it, and put it on the desk.

"Morning," he murmured.

Ellison glanced up. "Oh - morning," he said. "You were very quiet - I didn't hear you."

"Just totally concentrating on what you were reading?"

"I suppose," Ellison agreed.

Blair knew what it was like, to be concentrating so hard on something that the outside world just didn't exist - but at the same time... if Ellison had heightened senses, might losing track of what was happening around him when he was just reading be some form of zone-out?

"Here's that book I mentioned," Blair went on, pushing it over.

Ellison put down the report he was reading and reached for the book. He opened it.

There was a picture facing the first page of text, and Ellison gasped when he saw it. "Incacha!" he whispered.

Blair waited, hoping that Ellison would say more.

After a moment, Ellison looked up at Blair. "I... I was in Peru a few years ago. This... This man looks so like the shaman of the village where I was living... "

"Unlikely that they were related," Blair said. "Paraguay and Peru - a long way apart."

"Yes... but if this - " he indicated the picture - "was the shaman of his village... I know he looks more like a warrior, but even Incacha sometimes went out with the hunters."

Blair looked thoughtfully at him. "Peru... a few years ago. Time magazine? You're that James Ellison?"

"You don't want to believe half of what was in that article," Ellison muttered.

Blair grinned. "I didn't. Whoever wrote it had a word count to meet, and reading between the lines I could tell where he had expanded on the facts he was given."

"How old were you when you read it?"

"Sixteen. I was a freshman at Rainier. We were given it as assigned reading, then had to discuss it. We were pretty well all agreed that if it had stuck to hard fact obtained through the interview it would have been about a third of the length it was."

Ellison was silent for a moment. "I felt sorry for the guy who spoke to me. He was given an almost impossible assignment. I was ordered to meet him, tell him something about my time in Peru - but there was a lot I couldn't say. The political situation down there has eased a lot now, but I still can't say much about why we were sent there."

Blair nodded. "That was pretty much the conclusion my class came to. Giving the interview was good PR, but the army has its secrets.

"Anyway," he went on, "all that is beside the point. The book is about people in Paraguay with heightened senses, not people in Peru - or Washington State."

Ellison closed the book. "Can I take this home?" he asked.

"Well, you have work to do here - so you can't sit and read it here. I expected you to take it home, read it over several evenings, see if anything in it might help you.

"Now - is what you're reading there a continuation of what you were reading yesterday?"

"Yes. There was a robbery in one of the supermarkets quite late last Friday. Several men, all armed. They gathered the customers together in one part of the shop, and forced one of the staff to open all the tills. Got away with a lot of money. All those customers... a lot of witness statements."

"And you have to read through them - looking for details that match?"

"Yes."

"And quite a lot of the details don't match?"

"There are always some discrepancies," Ellison agreed. "So far I haven't found anything that looks at all helpful."

Blair hesitated. "Would it be possible for me to see some of them?" he asked. "It would give me more idea of what's involved in checking statements."

"It gets pretty boring after a while," Ellison warned.

"I'm used to that." Blair gave a wry chuckle. "Nothing could be more basically boring than grading papers for a university class - except when some idiot jock has completely failed to read up on the material and just makes something up."  He took the papers Jim handed to him and began to read. After a minute he dived into his backpack, pulled out a small notebook and a pencil and began making notes.

"Will you be taking that notebook away with you?" Ellison asked. "Because what you're reading - "

"Don't worry," Blair said. He handed the notebook over, and Ellison looked at what was written on it, then back at Blair.

"Code?"

"A sort of personal shorthand I developed when I was still an undergrad. No lecturer - and I admit I'm as bad as everyone else - gives his lectures at a speed that lets the students take full notes. Everyone develops ways of noting down what he - or she - thinks are the salient points. I tried taking a class in 'proper' shorthand early on - got nowhere with it - and worked something out for myself. I'd defy anyone else to make sense out of it."

"Okay," Ellison agreed and handed the notebook back.

They read in silence for a while, Blair making the odd note. After a while he put down the last of the reports Ellison had given him and glanced over what he had written down.

He licked his lips. "Detective... did you notice... "

In fact, Ellison hadn't - and Blair's observation proved to be very helpful.

***

It gave Ellison more appreciation of the intelligence of his unwanted ride along, especially when, over the next few days, Blair made several more helpful suggestions.

The book Blair had lent him also proved to be surprisingly helpful, and as he read it, Ellison found himself remembering more and more about his time in Peru - something he had allowed himself, or perhaps encouraged himself, to forget. Things he had done to help the Chopek... ways in which Incacha had supported him.

And he was beginning to realize that his young ride along was giving him the same kind of help - albeit in a more subtle, almost unconscious way.

***

Blair looked exhausted when he stumbled into the bullpen one morning about two weeks later. He was carrying, not just his usual backpack, but two - the second one a little bigger than the usual one. He dropped them at the side of Ellison's desk.

"Sandburg?"

"Detective. Do... would you mind if I wasn't here today? And could I leave my bags here? I'm going to have to... to... "

"What's happened?"

"My apartment block was destroyed last night. Nobody's sure just what happened, but there was an explosion in one of the apartments about two this morning. I took two or three minutes to shove some clothes and one or two irreplaceable items and important paperwork into a spare pack, grabbed my usual backpack as well and got the hell out. Hit the street about the time the fire department arrived. But by that time the building was well ablaze. Most of the tenants...  At least I rescued a few things. I think I was the only one who did; everyone else was more intent on just getting out. But the building is completely destroyed; I don't think it's repairable. Demolishing and rebuilding is the name of the game... I'll need to spend at least part of today looking for somewhere to stay - probably have to go to a cheap motel for a few nights."

Ellison looked at him. Blair was making a surprisingly good job of keeping himself together, but it was obvious to the detective that the younger man was badly shaken.

And then Ellison surprised himself.

"You don't need to go to a motel unless you want to. I've got a spare room - small, but if you don't mind sharing the living space you'll only need it to sleep in. You can stay with me until you find another apartment."

"You... you mean that? Man, that is so generous... though we'll have to come to some kind of financial agreement; I can't expect to freeload off you for even as little as a week - "

"I suspect it'll take more than a week for you to find somewhere and move in. The place is mine - no mortgage - so giving you the use of a room I don't use is no hassle. Unless you want to prepare your own meals and buy your own food, we can split all the extra running costs like food for as long as you're there. Okay?"

Blair looked at him. "What can I say but thank you."

"I know I wasn't as - well, welcoming - when you arrived as I might have been, but I have to admit you've actually been a lot of help to me. And... you can call me Jim."

Blair grinned. He was already, to the detective's discerning eye, looking more relaxed. "Thank you," he said again, "Jim."

 


End file.
